Safety Violations Put Strain On Lafayette College Fraternity

By day, Lafayette College's Delta Tau Delta fraternity house in Easton vibrates with life. Music blares from an open window while some students relax outdoors and others toss a Frisbee.

By night, the fraternity house is dark and quiet. The front door is locked, but from the outside.

A school security guard periodically patrols the three-story building to make sure it stays that way.

Out of the five fraternity houses closed by the city in July for health and fire code violations, Delta Tau Delta still is closed as Lafayette heads into the third week of the classes.

Although the students are allowed to enter the house by day, they must leave by 10:30 p.m. and find somewhere to sleep. They are allowed to return at 7:30 a.m.

Fraternity members say the ban is disrupting their education, inconveniencin g their friends, worrying their parents and costing more than $10,000.

"We need a place to sleep and eat," said Chapter President Doug Lee. "How are we going to concentrate on our work if we have to worry about food and sleep?"

Sleeping on floors, couches and if theyare lucky, beds, members rely on other fraternity houses and friends living in off-campus apartments for shelter.

"My parents are upset and concerned about me," said member Kevin Kozlowski. "I'm praying I make it through the semester."

Several members staying in the dens of the Phi Kappa Psi and Delta Kappa Epsilon fraternities say they have difficulty sleeping because the areas usually are full of students watching television.

"I've been staying in an off-campus apartment sleeping on the floor," said chapter Secretary Greg Pesky. "I'd like to crash in my bed."

Pesky has not told his parents because he didn't want them to worry.

The hardest blow came when the city forbade members from using the kitchen because of faulty wiring. The ban disrupted the fraternity's secondary source of income: the meal plan.

The meal plan is a system that allows fraternities to charge non-members $350 a semester for two meals a day.

The plan is favored by students living in sorority houses, which do not offer meal plans. Last year, Delta Tau Delta earned about $4,000 on meal plans.

The house's budget also is suffering because members are purchasing meals off-campus, Lee said.

"It's straining; we can't even get the meal plan off the ground because of the city," Lee said, biting into a Domino's pizza.

Membership also has dropped, from 46 to 36. Each member pays $2,200 per semester.

But the problem grew worse.

Five days before classes started, the house failed a second inspection. Lee said the inspector told him the whole house had to be rewired at a cost of $4,000.

"I think it's unfair that the fire inspector came a few days before classes to tell us we have to rewire the whole house," Lee said. "It's a big hassle. They should've told us what we had to do in the first inspection."

Lee said he expects the electricians to finish work today and told all members to prepare for an inspection tomorrow.

Although fraternity members agree they are responsible for the violations, Kozlowski said he was unaware of the increased code standards because the house passed last year's inspection.

"The city has every right to do this but they initiated the changes so radically," Kozlowski said. "The standards skyrocketed and no one was informed of the severeness of the regulations."